The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1887-01-06
Claiming that Legalization of Pool Contracts
Will Materially Aid in Accomplishing
the End Sought by the Cullom Bill.
Senator Platt Argues in Opposition to
the Clause Prohibiting Pooling.
A Comprehensive Summary of the Measure
as Reported by the Conference Committee,
Showing all Its Important Features.
THE RAILWAY SIDE OF 1T.

mfr. Blanchard Shows How Pools Would Aid
the Purpose of the Bill.
NEW YORK, Jan. 5.-Georee r. Blanchard,
the well-known railroad man, has written
long letter to the Times on the interstate COM
merce bill In his letter Mr.. Blanchard says:
Conservative railway managers agree that it
should prohibit discriminating preferences and
unreasonable rates, and require publicity and
adequate legal penalties This entities their
grounds of dissent from its long and short haul
and anti pooling provisions to fair consideration.
1t Is impracticabe to solve this complex problem
by one land our frst) law on the subject, when
in thirty years, insular England, without State
lines or adjacent nations to confuse, or internal
seas and rivers to restrict rates, passed and re-
pealed 1000 railway measures, more or less of
them involving the principles of this bill. The
length haul problem has similarly
easier than with us. In none of them
has it to this date been so stringently
solved as now proposed, and in some 1t is yet
undetermined. It's solution cannot be easiest
in country Offering the greatest mileage and
complications. which increase in geometrical
ratio. This clause recognizes that it will result
in wrongs, as witness the proviso authorizing
the commission to license exceptions 1t ig-
nores the fact that the warning power alone has
in all the States having railway commissions,
proved efficient to correct real evils. The great
carrying wrongs alleged before the Shepburn
committee In this State have all been silently
corrected without legislation as to length Of
haul by the almost unexercised police power Of
the State commission. Given as fair and acces-
sible national commission, with due power and
discretion, reporting annually to Congress, and
an interested public watching and presenting
its grievances, and particularly in view Of the
anti-corporate sentiment Of Congress, the rail-
ways would even more promptly correct uDjusti-
fable rates and carrying conditions"
In regard to pooling, which the bill prohibits,
Mr.. Blanchard says:
Il object to the term pool but must use it.
The underlying motive Of this prohibition is that
if railways be legally slim ulated to disunited
strife. by denying them the right of united CO.
operation, the public will he benefited No more
superficial view could prevail. and it is clearly
political rather than practical. Conceded that
all interstate rates shall be reasonable, Uniform,
non p Preferential, public, long and short hauls
property related, apd thar a national commission
enforce all this, and with due remedies at law to
punish violators, then the public should welcome
rather than resist all supplementary voluntary
railway action intended to aid precisely those
good objects, as every pool does Rival
of agreement between rival carriers,
and agreement is equally necessary
to thereafter maintain them. Otherwise each
company will make it's own rates, which is dis
elimination, and their non-agreed changes will
provoke moro discrimination. Moreover, ship.
pers must know their rates before they ship,
but railways need not. This fact and the pub
licity required, also necessitate agreement.
OtnerWlSe the cGaOS WD1cn some re1OrmerS call
competition. If the government owned every
railway in the Union, it would require equal
rates under equal conditions, as they do equal
customs and postage dues. 1t would also re-
quire an organization. or pool to maintain its
equal rates of transportation, as it now requires
a custom house pool and postoffce 'poor-the
terms being used respectfully. Then. some
form of equitable tonnage distribution would
also be essential, otherwise one railway, or sys-
tenn, or district, or city would overcarry, and to
| n
be pooling
1.-The States have not been able alone to regu-
late this great question: hence the present action
by the general government Widely separated
and independently chartered, common carriers
have not. for similar reasons, been able 20 regu-
late it without just railway federation, which
the government would adopt and strengthen.
and not abandon, If it owned and operated
them. Whatever ratea are unreasonable the
law and the commission should reduce to rea-
sonableness but thereafter the same reasonable
rates can. and should, and will be expected,
with or without pools. Assume, again. that the
pools were thus abolished 1t would be clear
corporate duty and public need that the railway
promptly devise some other legal machinery by
agreement or by dividing tonnage instead OF
| money, to make, preserve and main tain rhe same
onableness and uniformity Of charge and
equality of method and facility. If, there
fore, rates be reasonable, it has never been
shown what proper public interest attaches
to the methods by which
they are made or maintained, or the
tonnage or revenues derived therefrom are di-
vided between the several first carriers, any
more than among their second connections.
There is no testimony that can prove that legal
rates wrong or exsurtionate or can do harm.
simply because administered by pool. Clearly,
it is better for New York city, if all its great
Western railways combine one in pool to
charge only one reasonable rate for all the like
traffic of all its merchants, as if they were one
frm than to have the separated railways and
various merchants scramhling for the strongest
lzAf~ - -
This bill only requires that each company or
route shall charge the same rate to ali. 1t,
therefore stops far short of what it should re-
quire, at least legalize that all companies be-
tween the same points charge the same rates.
In this broad mercantile aspect the pool is iuster
than the law, because If the eight railways from
Chicago, eastwardly, make eight different
rates to New York, the result upon
the commerce of both cities is precisely
as discriminating. non-uniform, preferential and
disastrous as il the same eight rates were made
! over one railway. This statement deles refuta-
ton, but it Is comprehensive view which tho
clamorinR general public, who are not forward
ers or travellers, a rule. do not take notice of
it. Every pool in the Union has increased tom
mage and reduced rates below those agreed to by
the former methods If, therefore, a section
was in the bill to require that all pool agree
ments be submitted to the national commission,
with the requirement that il they contained no
conditions at variance with law public policy,
they should be approved, IL could not fail of
public good. So fortified, and working in ac-
cord with the general commission the same
number Of railway pool commissioners can do
the public more good than the national commits
sion can possibly accomplish in much longer
time.
I'VE go no further than mere reioinder. and
say that if pools were lagalzed the law would bo
yet more quickly and thoroughly fulfilled. Eng
land has done so. Belgium and Germany find
that governmental ownership means the strong
est pools. and France districts and divides its
traffic, which is pooling. Ours is the country
whose size and complications most need cooper
alive traffic unity, and II has been found the